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Posted February 5, 2013 01:06 am - Updated February 5, 2013 01:11 am

Obama Blows Smoke Out of a Gun

Trying to be just one of the boys shooting skeet, the White House released a photograph of President Obama apparently shooting at clay pigeons at Camp David.I suspect Obama thinks he will convince the American people that he will preserve their right to keep guns for sport and hunting, thus placating the unsuspecting population as he prepares to disarm them of their defensive weapons.

Obama pretending to shoot was not very convincing.Smoke issued from his shotgun.Smoke has not been seen coming from shotguns for decades, since shotgun shells have been loaded with smokeless powder for more than 100 years.Obama is blowing smoke both literally and figuratively.

Just seven weeks after a massacre at an American elementary school, the White House released a photo of the president firing a gun. Strangely, no one seems to think this is in atrocious taste. We imagine the reaction would be quite different if it were, say, George W. Bush.

But a lot of people, including this columnist, doubt that the photo depicts what it purports to show. The White House distributed the pic in response to widespread skepticism of President Obama's assertion, in an interview with a liberal editor and a former campaign coordinator, that "up at Camp David, we do skeet shooting all the time." The man who infamously said that rural Pennsylvanians and Midwesterners "cling to guns" had never before publicly indicated any interest in shooting sports.

The photo, purportedly shot last Aug. 4 (which happens to be the president's birthday), shows Obama holding a shotgun. The barrel is smoking, indicating that the gun has just been fired. What's odd about it is that the president is aiming straight ahead, as if he were firing a rifle at a stationary target.

But in skeet shooting, the target, a disk known as a clay pigeon, is moving. It is launched from one of two "houses" and travels in a parabolic trajectory across the field. In order to hit it, one has to move the gun so as to follow the path of the clay. It's not impossible that one would fire at shoulder level, as Obama is doing in the photo, but it's unlikely. We therefore surmise that the picture is the product of a photo shoot, not a skeet shoot.

Expressions of dubiety about the photo have prompted some weirdly intense reactions from Obama partisans. Our old pal John Avlon lashes out at "Republican conspiracy nuts" who are "partakers of the paranoid style in American politics" and have succumbed to "the unhinged, hate-fueled impulse" toward "disrespect and near-dehumanization of this president."

Once upon a time, Obama told the American people he would not take their guns because he supported our Second Amendment.

Once upon a time, Obama told the American that he would reduce their health insurance costs by $2,500 per family per year.The IRS recently announced the average American family would be paying $20,000 for health insurance during 2013.

Once upon a time, Obama promised the middle class that none of their taxes would go up on his watch.Average American people are seeing a lot less money in their 2013 paychecks.

The American people have learned they cannot trust President Obama.Obama and those who support Obama are blowing smoke and telling lies, with the truth nowhere to be found.

We recall the prayer of President John Adams inscribed in the front of the fireplace mantle in the White House State Dining Room,

“I pray to heaven to bestow the best of blessings on this house and all that hereafter inhabit it.May none but honest and wise men ever rule under this roof.”